Hidden program in the new WT CD alerts Bethel who has visited apostate websites!! (page 5)

MeanMrMustard

@TD:

You wrote:

Even with a web beacon, there's still deniability. "My neighbor must have been piggybacking on my wireless" etc.

Very true. Yet, the probablity of that is low. Why not just clean house?

MeanMrMustard

@HintOfLime:

You wrote:

MeanMrMustard:
I was going to comment and suggest that exact same thing. If elders are already logging onto a site, it's something they could implement in an afternoon.
To take the system further, they could provide a handy site for something like say.. publishers reporting their monthly time. Registration would require the name and congragation of the publisher. Then, like you say - sprinkle images hosted on a JW site in a posts like this. When they get an IP match, an email is automatically issued to an elder in the local congragation that so-and-so is potentially reading apostate sites on the internet.
Publishers will quickly figure it out, a bethel insider will go on the 7 o'clock news - and two dozen lawsuits later they'll stop sending emails to the local elders (but continue tracking, of course).
- Lime

Exactly... it could happen in about 10/20 minutes easy. They could record over a month or two and quickly build a decent database of elders out on sites like JWN. Well, minus the ones that have their wireless piggy-backed by the neighbor... :)

They could claim that having the individual publishers log their time online would relieve the local elders from keeping account on the publishers cards, and can allow transfers into new congregations go much faster/easier.

Of course, as soon as a single elder got DFed from it, that elder would be on all the forums letting everyone know what happened. All would then know that the WTS is up to some serious house cleaning... But then again, why would the WT care? Their goal would be to get rid of all those pesky elders that are posting things like the new elders manual...

MeanMrMustard

AllTimeJeff

This post directed at Moshe or anyone in particular. As a general statement, I always wish to keep in front of everybody just how amateurish Bethelites are.

The idea that the GB or upper crust Bethel elders follows apostate websites as it relates to a campaign to monitor websites and keep track of moles is absurd.

(I do allow that higer ups DO visit, but for their own purposes and curiosity. As a policy, they don't really care what apostates say, just as long as their flock doesn't listen or believe them.)

Simply put folks, they can't because they aren't that talented! They can't follow moles on the internet, and they can't embed images in pictures designed to get you to become and/or stay a JW.

For one thing, they are cheap. They also aren't THAT paranoid. It has always been my strong belief that the GB believes, esp at this late date, that apostates will always pop up, they are collateral damage to be expected and best handled by disfellowshipping and shunning.

Disfellowshipping is the weapon of choice against apostates, not monitoring websites. Love bombing and lies are the key to recruiting new followers, not embedded spiral images stuck in pictures of paradise.

MeanMrMustard

@AllTimeJeff:

Agreed. They aren't actually doing it. We would know after the first occurance of an elder being DFed for apostate activity on a website like JWN. That elder would be telling everyone about it, with nothing to lose. Right now, I don't think they care. But, what was being commented on was the ability to actually get their hands on such info (which elders or JWs frequent JWN-like sites).

You wrote:

" Simply put folks, they can't because they aren't that talented! They can't follow moles on the internet, and they can't embed images in pictures designed to get you to become and/or stay a JW."

I don't know about that. Their IT department would have to all be literal retards for them to not be able to turn on IP logging... its just a setting, and the rest is taken care of by the web server.

MeanMrMustard

BTW - like your avatar

TD

Well, minus the ones that have their wireless piggy-backed by the neighbor... :)

:-)

That's one possible (albeit uncommon) scenario, but there are certainly others. Under normal circumstances, everyone in an entire household would have the same IP address. An unbaptized adolescent would be a "Get out of jail free" card. Ditto for an unbelieving wife, husband, son or daughther. Ditto for extended family who might have internet access when they visit. (I noticed that my smartphone automatically connected to the wireless router in a JW relative's home and then recalled that I had set it up for them.)

Also, as you undoubtedly know, a web beacon tells you that the third party content on a web page has been loaded, but it doesn't tell you the circumstances. Even in a household of baptized JW's you wouldn't know who loaded the page and under what circumstances it was loaded. Was it arrived at accidently? Even if the page was viewed multiple times, it could still be hard to separate teenage curiosity from active disloyalty without specifically knowing who in the household visited the site.

AllTimeJeff

Good point Mr Mustard. Part of the talent is the leadership needed to pull that off. I don't think the GB has the inclination to do it or the trust in those who would have to do it.

The GB knows it would get out, and I definitely bow to that point. But tracking down IP addresses and linking them to people is one of those "more trouble then what it's worth" scenarios. I don't think it is as simple as it sounds either. If anything

Theoretically, yes, they can do it. But they aren't set up for it, don't trust those who would do it, and would much rather DF you then track you down.

Nathan Natas

when I saw your subject line, I was going to call BS on it. I'm glad to see this is only a hypothetical, like all JW theology.

suenott63

I am suprised that a hacker has not hacked the watchtower computers to get the secrets they are hiding like the peadophile register and so on.

Chariklo

This post @AllTimeJeff and everyone

This post directed at Moshe or anyone in particular. As a general statement, I always wish to keep in front of everybody just how amateurish Bethelites are.

The idea that the GB or upper crust Bethel elders follows apostate websites as it relates to a campaign to monitor websites and keep track of moles is absurd.

Sorry, but I think that thinking is a bit unrealistic. It doesn't matter if Bethelites are amateurish or not...I have no idea....the kind of technology that can track is not particularly hard to get hold of these days.

Think about it. However much skill and know-how are needed, if they wanted to do anything technological, no matter how sophisticated, they could. Bethelites are not, as a general rule, trained lawyers, are they? But the WT has lawyers.

We know from another thread that in 2010 the annual income was $750 million...I'm not clear if that was just in the US or worldwide, but we do know that in the UK alone in that year the income was £25,767,565 and expenditure was £17,968,609.

So if they want something, they can buy it.

But they wouldn't need to. People out there are clever, even JW's. Not all are born-in and denied the chance of education. Some poor fools, like me, actually walk in, eyes wide shut, but are otherwise intelligent and educated. In the congregation here there are teachers etc, and one is not only a teacher of all things computer but does his own stuff and could probably do somehting like this while he ate his breakfast.

It doesn';t even take people who work in the business. There are teenagers out there who can do very clever stuff indeed, and I know at least two personally. I also know two further brothers in the KH who do programming, and one is an elder.

So, what I'm saying is that these days it is just not good enough to assume that something can't be done, nor that it's against privacy rights. Especially the latter.

Do you think they care about privacy rights?

I'm not saying I'm right, Jeff, Moshe and everyone, but I think I might be.

moshe

So if they want something, they can buy it.

Quite true. The WT would only need to find one secret apostate on this forum to send the rest of them a runnin' for the foxholes.

Hidden program in the new WT CD alerts Bethel who has visited apostate websites!!

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